Life! Living with chronic pain.

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Archive | November 2010

I know this was stupid. I don’t care. I’m not embarrassed…for one, no one reads me, for two…i just don’t care…maybe someone else feels wide awake and nutz at dawn and finds this! You are not alone! lol…Guess I will read…some more…I just want a sense of peace. I think I’ve been searching for peace since I was born…I was born into chaos and that never stopped. Ever. I didn’t raise my kids in chaos…atleast not mostly…so I pray they don’t deal with this crap. Atleast not to this extent. I love those two kids more than words can convey, and I worry about their lives so much…but I’ve got to quit. Gotta quit worrying myself sick over their lives. At 22 and almost 17 they are doing ok…not great, but okay…they will muddle thru life like we all do. I thought I could save them from making mistakes I made, lead them down the easy road…but I can’t…kids don’t want that.They want to fumble and figure it out on their own without my bigmouth spewing the right way to do things. Even though I do know the easier ways or the better ways….they gotta do it themselves. That’s hard for me to do. I’m a very handson mom…always there for everything. Mommy will fix it. Maybe it did them more harm than good…I do’n’t know. They are great kids. Funny kids. Loving kids. They will make it. I love them so much. I want so much for them.

Rambling. Yep. I’m rambling. Well, why not? I can’t sleep…..I’m typing…may as well ramble…about sleep now….why can’t I sleep? Tell me. I am about to take 2 ambien I swear.Good thing I don’t gotta get up for church…I been wantin to find a church…but no way can I do Sunday morning services…no flipping way. I need church that is like Sundy night or Wednesday night…then I would love it….otherwise, I will keep my relationship with God between He and I…we chat all day long, and I write him letters he surely loves…lol

Ok…done with the psychoramblings of a sleep deprived woman. Someone send me a voo doochant that will work on me to sleep! plz. xoxo

Okay…this is probably going to make me look insane to some, but that’s okay, because right now I’m feeling a bit insane. For those who don’t know, I have a blood clotting disorder called Antiphospholipid Syndrome, where my blood clots too much, there is no cure, I must take a blood thinner called Coumadin everyday for the rest of my life to keep my blood thin. I go to a clinic about once month or more often to have my levels checked, for the last month my blood is staying too thick, even when they increase my Coumadin, so I have been going weekly. This costs me money out of pocket. Our health insurance isn’t great, so I must pay out of pocket for about half of the charge of these visits. But the cost isn’t really the main topic of this entry.

The main topic is fear. It’s the major fear I have that I am going to die of a blood clot. I have had this fear of course since being diagnosed. But the fear has grown exponentially lately, and it’s gone into hyper over-drive since I broke my ankle/foot. Because being immobile will increase your risk for bloodclots for healthy people, much less for me. Last night my leg, the one with the broken ankle, started hurting badly…in the calf area. So I started freaking out internally. I tried to flex my leg and foot muscles as much as I could, to get blood pumping. Then I began having left-sided chest pain…so of course in my head I became panicked that a clot had travelled to my lung! But I was alone, Jim at work, Jess in bed. Now I could’ve woke her up, I could have called 911 or my doctor…BUT, a huge part of me thought, “NO! Don’t run up MORE medical bills! It is more than likely NOT a clot. It’s more than likely muscle spasms from the injury.” I checked the back of my calf, it was not red or warm, which would be indicative of a clot. I was not short of breath, just having chest pain. So, I tried to calm myself and I got out my papers, that I keep bedside in the event of a health emergency, that describes all my health problems and the medications I take. I keep it in my purse and at bedside in case I can’t talk to explain my issues.

At any rate, I chewed a baby aspirin, which I really shouldn’t do…because it’s just as dangerous to allow your blood to get too THIN…you can just spontaneously start to bleed internally or have an aneurysm. But I eventually fell asleep. When I got up this morning the same leg was still hurting…in the calf, but feels like it goes up the back of my thigh also. Just occassional left sided chest pains, no shortness of breath. I told my husband about it all. He of course doesn’t know what to say. Neither of us want more damn medical bills, especially if it’s for something that isn’t an issue! I remembered that I still had some compression stockings from one of my hospital stays…they help keep circulation in your legs. So I had him get one out and I put it on my bad leg. He’s at work now. I’m alone. My leg is throbbing like crazy from the top of my foot up to my hip. I am pretty sure its probably all due to the foot injury. I’m trying not to over react or panic, but it’s hard. Really hard.

I can’t seem to make this extreme fear of having a blood clot go way. I go to the clinic again Friday and I’m gonna talk to them about it. I am also going to look for a therapist I can go to so I can talk freely without feeling I am being a burden to everyone I know. I have all these fears inside me, that I have usually been able to keep down, but they are really starting to get to me. How to keep myself from automatically thinking every leg or chest pain is a clot….cuz I think I just send myself into a panic, and cause the symptoms to get worse. Or, maybe right now as I sit here typing this, I have a huge damn clot in my leg that I should be going to the hospital for! But…because we are poor and have shitty health insurance, I hesitate to go. That’s crazy. But this type of situation is going on in so many households across the country is mind boggling!

I wish I had a 24 hour nurse or doctor with me at all times! lol….I told Jim today he should just put my useless ass in a nursing home and forget about me and get on with his life. This crap is so unfair to him and my family. I’m only 43. I should be able to be taking care of everyone else, going out on the town, going on walks, whatever. Not being deadweight. But anyway, I just wanted to get it out there, just say it outloud to the world…I AM AFRAID! I am living in constant fear of this damn blood disease! It didn’t really send me over the edge until this injury. I’m trying to breathe thru it. Trying to stay rational. Trying to have other explanations for the symptoms. But I can’t help but thinking, what if I am right? What if it is a blood clot and I’m ignoring it and then will die from something that possibly could have been taken care of at a hospital? What if? What if I’m wrong and I go to the hospital and wrack up another $1,000 in medical bills and it’s nothing? What if?

So I am hoping I can just rid my fear by getting this out of my head. Come to a realization that worrying about this so much will not help me at all. What will be will be. I will die from whatever I’m supposed to die from… when the Lord has decided it’s time for me to go. So I need to just chill. Stop fretting like a little old lady. Just breathe. Keep my circulation goin in my legs. Be mindful of the symptoms, but not go into full panic mode and CAUSE false symptoms. So right now, that’s my plan…but I gotta say, my foot/leg is just throbbing/cramping like crazy. My pain meds aren’t helping. I’m thinkin it maybe even hurts more since I put on that stocking. Maybe my acebandage is too tight. I will take off the boot, take off the bandage, take off the stocking and redo everything, then put it all back on and see how it feels…after I recover from the exhaustion of doing all of that!

With all my illnesses and pain issues, it’s understandable that I am afraid. I’m afraid of death. Now I have said and or thought at times that I did just want to die. To escape this pain and misery. But at the same time I want to live, because I want to be here for my family….in a selfish way I guess…I know they would survive without me…my kids are both strong…they would survive…but I don’t want them to have to. I don’t want them to go through that. I’m selfish in that I want to be here with them. I want to watch their lives unfold. I want to be here for grandchildren. I want to be here in the world and enjoy things I can enjoy. I guess I just need to come to terms with death. If it’s my time, it’s my time. Nothing I can do about it, right? What will be will be. I would just hate for it to be because I was too stupid or cheap to go to the hospital…it’s a shitty situation.

I hate feeling like this crazy person. I have to change my thinking process. I hate fear. I consider myself a strong and courageous person…but this fear of bloodclots is getting the best of me. Even after typing all of this, my leg throbbing and occassional chest pains…I’m indecisive. No shortness of breath. Leg not red or warm. Gonna loosin up the leg gear, and see how it feels from there. Thanks for reading the rant of a crazed woman! 😉

Well…for those who do not know, I broke my ankle/foot last Saturday. I was leaving our local outdoor mall where my husband and I had just went to see a movie, then had gone to Cold Stone for some ice cream…that was amazing by the way (Coffee Lovers). It was dark, I was walking at a normal pace, I think I was switching my purse from one arm to the other when SNAP! This bomb exploded in my right ankle and the fire spread up my leg, and my butt hit the ground…I had fallen off the curb, and I looked to my husband in shock…not only from what was occurring right then, but because exactly one week previously at the same mall I had tripped UP a curb and fallen forward and skinned, bloodied and bruised my knees, ribs, elbows and ripped my new jeans!

I mean what is wrong with me? Now I can’t even walk? Suddenly I have no clue how to maneuver curbs? Like my son said (in the same sarcastic tone of his mom) “Do you see curbs and think you can DEFY them??” lol. Now here I am, on the ground, people milling by, my husband is freaking out and I am as usual trying not to call attention to myself or my predicament, telling him to go get the car and bring it to the curb…I’m holding my foot, sitting on the curb, yet trying to act like this was the most normal thing in the world to be doing…I swear if I was out in public and my arm fell off, I would hold it up and pretend it was still attached until I was alone or at home. Why am I like that? I have no clue.

I have had many sprained ankles and even broken them before. I was younger then. I didn’t have all these other health issues then. I wasn’t already dealing with major pain then. This is HARD. I have this heavy Frankenstein boot on my RIGHT foot (can’t drive), using crutches is next to impossible because it requires using your abdominal muscles, which I don’t have and it makes my hernia buldge out as far as it can. I cannot put ANY weight on my foot for six weeks. So for the first week, I literally stayed in bed, only using the crutches for short trips to the potty. I have a wheelchair from previous illness, but it’s a transport chair with the little wheels, so you can’t wheel it yourself…not that I could anyway with my abdomen issues, but we have been using it when I must be taken to doctor appointments. Today we went and rented me a knee walker, thinking that would be the perfect thing, just rest my bad leg on it and scoot around the house!

First of all, it’s a damn crime how much these things cost to rent! $150 per month! Or more at some places! Buying them is double or triple that. So I’ve been kinda using it around the house tonight…I have ran over my good foot twice, got myself in our tiny bathroom and couldn’t get it turned around to get out, same with my tiny kitchen (galley type), and my good leg is now exhausted from scooting around the walker! I’m a walking catastrophe!

I know my husband and daughter are sooo sick of waiting on me. I honest to God try to limit my needs. But just the basics really add up. We don’t realize how much we need or do until we are asking others to do it for us! I mean, a glass of water…oh maybe a snack…oh, my purse, where’s that magazine? I need the phone please. Heating pad? Ice pack? Meds? Remote? Extra blanket? Turn fan on? Dvd? Feed fish? Feed/Water dogs? Let them out? Let them in? Breakfast? Lunch? Dinner? Lotion? Kleenex? Someones at the door!

And don’t get me started on taking a shower! It’s like a national event! I can’t do it alone, getting in and out that is…so, its like this “Ok, I need undergarments from that dresser over there I can’t get to cuz the wheelchair is in front of it, I need clothes from that closet I can’t get to cuz the box fan is in front of it..no not that shirt, the blue one..no, not that blue one…oh nevermind, I’ll wear a blue bonjovi tshirt with orange flowered pajama pants, who cares?…okay, now I’ll hobble down the hall, can you get me a towel and wash rag please? Get undressed with an audience, be assisted into the tub to sit on the shower chair…feeling exposed and embarrassed…shower head not pointed at me right…please point it so the water is actually hitting me? Finally I can close the curtain for privacy and wash…drop the soap, drop the razor…an Intuition, which falls into three pieces, I can’t get them…I give up on shaving. Finished, now freezing, trying to dry off, need help to get out of the tub and getting dressed…more embarrassment. Then must ask them to take my dirty clothes away and help me back to bed or recliner. I do not like others having to mess with my dirty clothing.

By the end of that we are all exhausted. I am hurting so bad I could not imagine anything hurting worse, but I shouldn’t say that cuz God may decide to show me differently. I am really feeling picked on. I feel like people must think I’m some kind of whining baby, but really…this is some crazy shit that has happened to me in the last five years! I have been thru more crap than anyone I know for sure. I don’t get it…I’m a good person, really I am. Am I truly cursed? Is there such a thing? Am I really being punished for something in a past life? Am I here for a purpose? Is my suffering for a purpose? Why is my family being tortured? I feel horrible for them. They are having to be my servants for God sakes! Like I said, I am alone alot, so once one of them gets here, I am in need of things! Not to mention just some human conversation! It’s a bummer to say the least.

I hate being helpless and needing so much help. REALLY hate it. I try to have them get anything I think I may need all in one trip, and will just not say anything if in fact they forgot something I needed…even if its a fork for my meal! lol. I have been dealing with illness and pain for a long time now, and was helpless for part of that…but I was a very drugged and in a coma type of helpless then, so it wasn’t quite as distressing as it is now. The holidays are coming…will I be healed by then? I have Christmas shopping to do…and I do NOT like to do that with my husband…lol, that is something I prefer to do alone, so I don’t want to have a “babysitter” to drive me around then!

The worst time though is around four in the morning. I have been asleep maybe two hours, and suddenly am bolted awake by severe burning ankle/foot pain! It feels as if someone is beating it with a sledgehammer, while simultaneously setting it ablaze! I get the boot off and put on an icepack that I have thankfully thought to request before everyone went to bed, I take an extra dose of pain medication, hoping I don’t OD! There is no comfortable way to sleep. IF I sleep at all. I’m so tired right now, but I know I couldn’t just lay back and sleep. I need a shower, but no one has had a moment to help me with that today…maybe tomorrow.